Prague, March 2 (CTK) – The salaries of Czech security corps will rise by 10 percent as of July, the interior and finance ministers, Milan Chovanec (Social Democrats, CSSD) and Andrej Babis (ANO), respectively, agreed yesterday.
The Finance Ministry will seek about one billion crowns to add to the 600 million which the Interior Ministry will release for the total rise of 1.6 billion crowns this year.
The proposal is yet to be approved by the government.
“We are jointly settling a historical debt to the security corps,” Chovanec said.
He said the agreement will resolve the reduction of the security corps’ salaries under the government of Petr Necas (Civic Democrats, ODS, in office 2010-13).
The Finance Ministry first disagreed with the pay rise as from July and it proposed that it only be applied as from next year.
Babis said yesterday the demand was justified because the police only offer very low starting salaries.
He said the money should not be drawn from the budget reserve. “We must find it somewhere else in the budget, this is our task,” Babis said.
Police President Tomas Tuhy said yesterday’s agreement is a good signal for the police.
“It will definitely help stabilise the unsatisfactory situation,” Tuhy told CTK.
He said the salaries will be raised across the whole corps.
The police corps has about 40,000 members and there are more than 9700 firefighters. The pay rise would also apply to customs officers, prison wards and the secret services.
($1=25.654 crowns)